I have spent 20 years working in nonprofit think tanks, the last 13 as a resident scholar with the Institute for Policy Innovation in Dallas. I also ran the Washington, D.C.-based Council for Affordable Health Insurance for nearly nine years. While I cover a range of political, economic and policy areas, I specialize in health policy. Prior to joining the think tanks, I taught philosophy. I received all three of my degrees—BBA in economics, masters in divinity and Ph.D. in humanities—from Texas universities. I was an ethicist for a medical school's panel reviewing human experimentation. I'm a member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Texas Advisory Committee. For several years I was a political analyst for the USA Radio Network, and I hold a 6th degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do and still teach.

Boehner To House GOP: Read My Lips -- Break Your Campaign Promises

WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 9: U.S. Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) addresses the media during a press conference in the U.S. Capitol building November 9, 2012 in Washington, DC. Boehner called for delaying the fiscal cliff and extending Bush-era tax cuts until 2013. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

In a remarkable turn-around, House Speaker John Boehner has apparently put tax hikes on the table in his fiscal cliff negotiations with President Obama. That’s after virtually every House Republican campaigned against raising any tax rate. Thus House Republicans may find themselves being pushed by their own leadership to follow President George H.W. Bush’s (Bush 41) sorry example—and getting booted out of office because of it.

Bush 41’s most memorable line from his 1988 Republican Convention acceptance speech was, “Read my lips: no new taxes.” But when push came to cave, he raised tax rates as part of a 1990 budget agreement with Democrats to reduce the deficit. Sound familiar?

That action infuriated conservatives and others around the country and demoralized his base. That wasn’t the only reason Bush lost his reelection bid in 1992, but it was a big part of it.

Fast forward to the 2012 election. While the rumored Boehner offer of limiting the hike to those making $1 million or more is certainly a very small group, and most could no doubt afford some tax increase, and many of them were Obama supporters—and so it would serve them right, though all of those hypocrites will try to dodge the tax increase— virtually every House Republican campaigned against raising taxes on anyone. And “anyone” includes high-income earners.

Let’s assume that Obama agrees to a deal that hikes taxes on the rich, and that most Democrats will support it—both are “big IF” assumptions. Boehner would have to deliver up some Republican votes to pass the measure in the House, demanding that his conference break their campaign promise.

Some might go along willingly, but most Republicans believe they learned a lesson with the Bush 41 defeat.

Indeed, opposition to tax increases isn’t just a Republican ideal; it has become part of the party brand. It’s what Republicans stand for, just as Democrats stand for higher taxes and more government spending.

Asking House Republicans to break their campaign promise to oppose new taxes is like asking the National Rifle Association to support gun control, or Planned Parenthood to back abortion restrictions. And yet if Boehner cuts a deal with Obama he will have to ask Republicans to follow Bush 41’s guide to self-destruction.

That effort will lead to a number of Tea Party-backed primary challenges in 2014, which could oust some pledge-breaking incumbents and put a safe seat into play. Like Nancy Pelosi’s demand that House Democrats vote for ObamaCare, Boehner could win the battle but lose the war—and the majority.

Or he could face a serious challenge to the speaker’s role in January.

Of course, even with the Boehner tax hike on the table, there is a good chance an agreement will fail. First, Obama wants it to fail because it plays into his plan for more big-government solutions.

We’ve seen this pattern before. When Franklin D. Roosevelt won election in 1932, he had to wait until March for his inauguration. The defeated, lame duck Herbert Hoover saw a banking crisis emerging and wanted to stop it. He pleaded with FDR to work with him to avert the crisis. But FDR adviser Rexford Tugwell finally explained to Hoover that FDR had no intention of acting because the worse the crisis became, the more willing the country would be to let FDR have carte blanche to do whatever he wanted.

Second, assuming the reports are accurate, Obama has seen Boehner blink. A Politico story contends that Republicans are still demanding spending and entitlement cuts, and they want any debt ceiling increase to be accompanied by big spending cuts. Good luck with that.

Democrats will surely (and probably accurately) reason that if the speaker caves on tax increases, Republicans’ most sacred principle, he will likely cave on other points, too.

And, third, Boehner may not be able to secure enough Republican votes.

There has been some suggestion that the tax-increase proposal is a Boehner ploy: Put the increase on the table and when the president rejects it Boehner can say he made concessions but the president refused them. Hence, going over the fiscal cliff wasn’t Republicans’ fault.

But trying to play the media to Republican advantage is a fool’s game. Boehner could agree to every Obama demand, but if the president still refused to accept a deal the media would inevitably blame Republicans.

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